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Shine | 
| Artist: Joni Mitchell
Label: Hear Music / UMTV
Category: Music
List Price: £16.99
Buy New: £9.98
You Save: £7.01 (41%)
New (53) Used (7) from £4.96
Rating:  26 reviews
Sales Rank: 2245
Media: Audio CD
Running Time: 47
Discs: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 5.6 x 5 x 0.5
MPN: 30457
UPC: 888072304574
EAN: 0888072304574
ASIN: B000UR366S
Release Date: September 24, 2007
Shipping: Eligible for Super Saver Shipping
Availability: Usually dispatched within 24 hours
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| Tracks:
| • | One Week Last Summer | | • | This Place | | • | If I Had a Heart | | • | Hana | | • | Bad Dreams | | • | Big Yellow Taxi (2007) | | • | Night of the Iguana | | • | Strong and Wrong | | • | Shine | | • | If |
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| Editorial Reviews:
Amazon.co.uk Review
In 2002, Joni Mitchell--folk legend and creator of timeless albums like Blue, Hejira and The Hissing of Summer Lawns--went into retirement. Following the release of that year's Travelogue album, she denounced the music industry and at the same time announced plans to pursue her other passion: painting. Shine, Mitchell's 17th studio album and her first collection of new songs in almost a decade, is therefore something of a surprise. Inspired by the need to speak out against warmongering politicos and environmental myopia, Mitchell has written ten elegant, sparse songs that match idiosyncratic arrangements (think chamber folk merged with curious 80s drum sounds and painterly daubs of sax and guitar) with incisive lyricism and her classic story-telling technique. Opening instrumental "One Week Last Summer" sets an optimistic tone, but the album veers mostly between melancholy, introspection, bitterness and even misanthropy. Mitchell's voice is more cracked than it used to be--but there's no denying her passion, nor her continued ability to write engaging tunes. -- Paul Sullivan
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| Customer Reviews: Read 21 more reviews...
 A Beginning / An Ending (Or Something In-Between )? October 26, 2008
6 out of 6 found this review helpful
A little late in the day to be sure sure but with good reason.
I wasn't sure I wanted to hear it but having bought the album
it then took me a good year to absorb its' wily charms.
'Shine' is a conceit of a sort you see.
The languidly marvelous orchestral excesses of'Both Sides Now' (2000)
and 'Travelogue' (2002) notwithstanding it has been almost
a decade since the last recording of new and original material and
'Taming The Tiger' (1998) could never be seen to have been a high point
in Ms Mitchell's long and illustrious career.
Having 'retired' from the business of strumming and singing in
2002 her muse lay dormant for a while but we can be glad that
she has set her paintbrushes aside and that those deep, dark internal
stirrings have once again percolated slowly to the surface in the shape
of 'Shine' - a late autumnal flowering and a far more worthy testimony
to the strange genius of one of the greatest writer/performers ever to
have blessed both our ears and our lives.
'Shine' is a very precious thing indeed.
Ten tracks - Eight new songs, an instrumental overture and one
canny reworking. Coming in at a little under 50 minutes the album
displays neither economy nor excess. Everything feels as if it is
in its' rightful place.
Environmental Destruction ( 'This Place' ); War ( 'If I Had A Heart' &
'Strong and Wrong' ) and Hope ( 'Shine' and 'If' ). Big Themes.
These compositions rank with the very finest she has produced.
The shuffling latin rhythm of 'Hana' ( a close musical cousin
to 1991's 'Cherokee Louise' );
the spare pathos and beauty of 'Bad Dreams';
the exotic, energizing grandeur of 'Night Of The Iguana';
the luminous relevance of 'Big Yellow Taxi' undimmed and undeterred.
Title track 'Shine' is nothing less than sublime.
This great lady's music had formed an important part of the soundtrack
to my life ( many of our lives very probably! ).
This latest installment represents a magisterial return to form.
Perhaps it may be too much to hope for further chapters
but we, like she, should always live with hope.
Essential.
She's Got The Sight, We Gotta Fight June 12, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
So here is the new album by Joni Mitchell in ten years.
Let your little lights shine and rejoyce, Joni Mitchell's back.
To me she never was gone though since her records rarely quit my CD player.
Releases by Mitchell are more than albums or just mere new collection of songs, each time they represent first of all major artistic events, and secondly different milestones in her life, witnesses of where she is versus where she was -sending us back to our own mirrored image-, precious flashes of today where she stands, showing this extraordinary and unique poet, woman, musician and painter -we all know that she wishes "painter" would be mentionned first since this is what she primarily was and still is, but I'll indulge into the lady's musical side right now since "Shine" is the topic of the day and not canvases -my apologies, Mrs Mitchell!!-
For the real fan-at-heart ones who wish they'd know what "Shine" ressembles before buying it -but any fan at heart would buy it without knowing, wouldn't they?- therefore just for the ones wondering whether "Shine" bears any similarities to previous works -which would be unconceivable coming from an artist who never repeated herself twice-, or how at least it can be positionned in the galaxy of gems that Joni Mitchell released before and so far-, well, it is true that there is an undeniable flavour coming from the Roses, between other things... Let's put it that way: this time the lady from Saskatchewan sent us Roses (tinted with the blues of despair) with a mighty wink from a certain Reckless Daughter, while the latter was drawing Chalk Mark in order to Tame some wild life's Tigers dying under the assaults of modern junk killing Mother Earth. If you don't get the riddle -but I'm sure you will since it's such an easy one-, "One week last summer" has the grace, pensiveness and gentleness from "For the Roses", just as "Strong and Wrong" is close to "Roses" in some ways musically speaking, "If" has indeniably be musically written by our own Reckless Daughter -even if the lyrics are only partially hers, but it is truly amazing to see how Kipling could not have found a better spokeperson, as his words do sound like pure Mitchell's!-, "Night of the Iguana" -besides being one of the album's best track-, wears the energy of some of the "Chalk Mark" era ("Snakes & Ladders"), and "Bad Dreams" (the best track with "Shine" and "If") are a righteous and logical prolongation of some of the most introspective efforts from "Taming the Tiger" ("Stay in Touch", "Face Lift").
This being said, the whole album is like any previous Mitchell's releases: very much her although surprising, musically adventurous ("Shine" with its so particular atmosphere and slow tempo is not like anything she has recorded before, even if the writing and structure are unmistakably classic Mitchell's), growing on you just as you listen to it more and more, and aknowledging the fact and certitude that Joni Mitchell, no matter what, in her youngest age or growing older, in revolt, mischievously ironic or just broken-hearted, with something to scream ("Dog eat Dog" album) or with just a desilusionned statement to make (this "Shine" album), with her crystal mellowed voice of yesterday or her husky and half-broken voice of today, remains the greatest and most moving recording artist of our times.
Reading the bad things she got on Amazon from disappointed listeners (not mentionning the editorial review which sounded unbelievably biased and expeditious to me), I was a bit left perplexed by the attacks.
"Shine" is not only a beautiful, elegant, unusually creative album on the music side of it, but also certainly one of the most coherent, intelligent, direct, straighfoward, courageous piece for what it says and contains. I was amazed to read people complaining about Mitchell caring for whales declining and not for people dying out (which is not even what she exactly said, plus!), and I certainly will not try to convince here with my own words just how Mitchell's position is right, clairvoyant, lucid and accurate -if her own brillant words failed to do so, mine as poor as they are will have thus still lesser success obviously-, but such responses just show how right she is to be pessimistic about the survival of mankind, as some people don't seem to realize that disappearing whales -between other things- mean a disappearing earth, and that there is no point in making children who will make mankind still heavier on this planet when the very planet on which these children will stand and try to feed from, simply won't be here anymore to sustain them... it's just common sense but apparently Man's egotism and selfishness for his own specy prevent him to use his brain and open his eyes. I am glad Joni Mitchell is wise, simply wise, and has eyes and brain for those who definitely lack both (-the zombies in shopping malls with their cellular between others / if only for this line, "Shine" merits to be listened to!-)
Joni Mitchell has already opened her mouth in the past ("The Fiddle and the Drum", "Three Great Stimulants", "Ethiopia", "Tax Free", "Lakota", "Sex Kills", "No Apologies", etc), and she continues to do so. People who blame "Shine" would better listen again to her previous recordings that they claim they loved, and would then realize there is just a coherent woman continuing to inform against the disgraces of the world. Except that this time the message is just a little more desperate and harsh than before, but is not the situation alike?
I was moved, to finish, by this artistic choice that Joni Mitchell made in reproducing on the CD itself a night view of Earth, so beautiful, sparkled with the night lights of the cities -small light bulbs, small witnesses of the energy of a doomed world?-. That reminded me her lines in "Refuge of the roads " from "Hejira" (her absolute masterpiece with the rest of the quadrilogy "Hissing of Summer Lawns", "Don Juan's", Mingus" and, and, and... I'll stop here the list, most of all other efforts by Joni Mitchell would deserve to belong to that category anyway!-), when she was then considering this picture of the Earth taken by the astronauts coming back from the Moon, this marbled bowling ball where no one could see anything, not a forest, a city or a highway, and her in her car the least of all.
Thirty years later, we still can't see Joni Mitchell on this picture, but her voice, her music, her intelligence, and the enormous heart that she pretends that she doubts having -but we all know how big it is-, are shining through, reminding us the fragility of this marbled bowling bowl, and dazzling us with the force of her talent, a force so great that it does light up a little hope in all that darkness -irrationnal, but quite luminous indeed.
Let her little light continue to shine on us, lighting up our insights, so that we can keep on the fight.
Hypnotic February 13, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
I play this in the car on my regular road trips and as far as I'm concerned it's as good as anything shes produced. It has the same hypnotic effect on me as Hejira. The twists and turns of the melodies and the music always surprises even after many plays.All you 1 star reviewers
are entitled to your opinions but I think you should really lighten up a bit and enjoy the music instead of overly analysing the lyrical content.
SHINE; Joni Mitchell January 10, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
Those who have ciritcised this in previous reviews I think just dont get it. The thing about Joni is she has managed over the years to produce something different every time without losing either her environmental/social conscience, and each time using different techniques, making her music sound current.
She has always managed to touch something deep inside those of us who care and the first peice in this album is one such. How many current performers can do this without a single word. and when she does sing, it gets you thinking. How passionate, how brave, how intelligent and thought provoking. Can be depressing yes, but then we do live in a messed up world. This is to me one of her most relevant pieces of work and I am just so glad I have it in my collection. Beautiful !
 Quit while you are still ahead... December 19, 2007
2 out of 7 found this review helpful
The genius who blessed us with timeless masterpieces like 'Hejira', 'Court and Spark' and 'For the Roses' amongst many might as well be a completely different person from this burnt-out, droning dirge which seems to endure beyond the welcome retirement she announced after the bombastic, pretentious, desecration of past gems which 'Travelogue' turned out to be.
The lyrics are poor, tiresome and bitter, the voice has not recovered and never will. Musically, it's thin, dull and all a bit like rehashed 'Turbulent Indigo' meets 'Taming the Tiger'.
One redeeming point is the decent 'If I had a heart' which could be beautiful if sung with a good voice.
I'm afraid to say, Joni WAS the pinnacle of singer-songwriting, an absolute miracle in music but I guess that like every star in the sky, her time came to fade away...
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